Schoolhouse Arts

Last night I managed to stitch the picot edge on three sides of my pyramid, much happier with it now.
Tonight it was round to Nickie's house to plan for the next six months at Schoolhouse Arts. I shall be doing my travel log which was to have taken place tomorrow but unfortunately we had to cancel because of low numbers. We are now going to be doing it in May. In July, Pauline Verrinder is coming to do a workshop for us. For those of you interested in what is going on look at our Schoolhouse Arts blog.

More reverse stitching!!!!!!!!

Last night I was able to spend a few hours sewing my dangly-bliss!!!!! BUT I was still worried by the wobbly picot edge on the pyramid, I have re-done it several times as it was not to my satisfaction, and after the last attempt I decided I was going to live with it, but I couldn't. So tonight come 9o'clock I will be re-stitching the picot edge AGAIN! I have to have it finished by next Sunday when I am at Cottenham for the Embroiderer's Guild meeting as Pauline needs it for the following Thursday when she sets up Textiles in Focus. Art Van Go are going to be there, I was going to try and be frugal in February, but I don't think that I will have much chance of that!

Back to the hospital-again

I came home from work anticipating getting lots done this evening, only to have my plans fly out the window within minutes of coming through the front door. My daughter was hit in the eye on Saturday with the ring pull on a drinks can, an accident, and had been complaining that it was hurting, she had a small red mark in her eye, but nothing else. Today though, she came home from school complaining that her vision was blurred. After ringing NHS Direct they advised us that as it was her eyes we should go to hospital to get it checked. So back to Basildon Hospital again, twice in one day! Three hours later I am happy to say no damage had been done, it was just a foreign body way down low, almost going behind her eyeball-thank goodness! But needless to say, by the time we had had an evening meal, made ANZAC biscuit mixture for school tomorrow, sorted my brothers invoices, my me-time has passed me by. Never mind ,tomorrow night-fingers crossed!

Bury St Edmunds

I finished my lemon and mustard seed chutney Sunday evening- and it tastes good! It only takes 5 large lemons to get this amount of pickle. This will help my credit crunch!

Last night Nickie and I borrowed my hubby's Sat. Nav. and went to Bury St Edmunds to give a talk to a patchwork group, amongst the audience was Annette Morgan- quite daunting, as we have heard her speak on several occasions. We also met up with 'Mrs Sat Nav' A.K.A. Shirley, a lovely lady who we got to know on our two visits to Belstead last year.

Before the talk we were given coffee and biscuits as we had left home at five. What a lovely group of ladies, thank you for being

such a good audience. For the ladies who were asking about the Fen Edge Textiles exhibition at Sutton Hoo and are going to be popping into this blog to find the date,it is June6th-21st, sorry I didn't have the dates with me last night, I suffered a senior moment!

I have had this morning off work as I had to my husband to hospital for a prostrate biopsy- we were there for several hours which enabled me to complete the hand stitching on three more broaches and sew half the picot edge on another medallion. I commented to my hubby, that this was a good way of getting lots of stitching done, and maybe he could do this again next week- he was NOT amused. He is lying downstairs on the couch taking it easy, following doctors orders. ( he does look a bit peaky, I must admit).

I have also had a chance to ring the Courts about my small claims that has been going on since October. I had agreed to go to mediation, but the defendant has not returned some paper work even with a seven day extension, so I now have to get a judgment- bailiff's of freezing of his bank account! The forms will be in the post tonight- I hate filling in forms, especially legal ones!!!

Well must go and feed the patient before I go back to work!

Lemon and mustard seed pickle

I started to cook my pickle this morning, but had to stop half way through to go and buy a new television set as our old one blew up yesterday. It was then round to Nickies to go over the arrangements for our evening out to Bury St Edmunds, where Nickie is doing a talk. I have come home to my son compaining about the'pong' in the houise from the pickle-just wait until I finish cooking it!

Does the tax man owe you any money?

If you read my blog and have children born between 1986-2002 you could be entitled to some money from the tax man. You need to look at your tax code and if it ends in H or T you have already had this payment, if not try claiming, you could get as much as £1,000. Just think of all those bills you could pay or textile bits you could buy! To claim this money you need to download a form 11CTC from hmrc.gov.uk, I don't use my blog for this type of info usually, but as we all work hard to keep our heads above water, we pay taxes, I thought I would share this with all of you out there. You need to get your claim in quickly as the deadline is 31st January 2009.

What little stitching time I have had this week I have spent on my dangly. The end is in sight, just not sure when. In my original sample I had used a blanket stitch and bead (ala Kemshalls)on the edging of my medallion and intended to do the same on the pyramid. When I blanket stitched my pyramid, the beads wobbled

all over the place, this didn't happen on my sample. I did lots of reverse stitching trying to get them to sit nicely without success.So I have now undone it all and replaced the blanket stitch edging with a beaded picot, it does sit better but still has a slight wobble. I have just got one more side to complete with the picot and then I can carry on joining the medallions together. This one I have been stitching at work in my tea breaks.

I have had an email from Pauline Verrinder last night to say that my class is now fully booked at Textiles in Focus.

As it is soooo cold, I have been doing a few chores before I can start to stitch. I have tackled the huge pile of ironing and I have got some lemon and mustard seed pickle fermenting, and I shall be cooking it up tomorrow. It was my fathers recipe and is lovely in cheese sandwiches! Quick to make too! The longest bit is the fermenting time, but well worth it!

Have you seen this job?

I didn't expect to get very much stitching done tonight as I had to do invoices for my brother and he also wanted me to write his C.V. for a job that has been advertised. I have posted the link.
http://www.islandreefjob.com/
What a great way to escape from all the news about the recession!!!! AND you get paid!!!!!
On reading the application I found I cant help him with his C.V., as it has to be done on a video and take less than 60 seconds to watch.
So I am now off to do some more work on my dangly.

At the moment it is a pleasure to slave at the kitchen sink, my hyacinth's have such a wonderful smell!

Tonight at Embroiderer's Guild it was member's night. I was up until 1 a.m. today stitching my sample to take to the meeting. After playing a silly game to break the ice, we got down to work. Members had been asked to bring in fabric, threads and embellishments in either green for spring, yellow for summer, red for autumn or blue for winter. The finished four inch squares will all be displayed at our branch exhibition 6th March-4th April at Chelmsford library. The committee took along cake for members to have with their cuppa.
I found it quite hard to stitch in red as it not a colour that I choose to work in, but, when I have a bit of spare time, LOL, I fancy making the three other squares to represent the other seasons and join them all together, hence why I attached my work to the card with eyelets rather than lacing.
Lots of talking and laughing, lots of stitching, lots of cake- a good night!

Camera found at last!!!!!

My camera has turned up, just as we were going to post off the insurence forms. Nickie found it when she was tidying up her studio!!!!!!